In the latest forecast from the International Air Transport Association (IATA), it is said that global airline profits will be higher than originally forecast. The number of people taking flights will be close to pre-pandemic levels.

According to IATA, about 4.35 billion passengers are expected to fly this year, close to the record 4.54 billion people in 2019.

In addition, the association also estimates that in 2023, net profits will reach 9.8 billion USD – double the 4.7 billion USD figure given in December 2022. The main reason is China lifting restrictions to control the pandemic.

Willie Walsh, General Director of IATA said: “Airline financial performance in 2023 is beating expectations.” Although the net profit was $9.8 billion, a large number, considering the industry’s revenue of $800 billion, the net profit margin here is only 1.2%. “After deep COVID-19 losses, even a net profit margin of 1.2 percent is something to celebrate,” he said.

Previously, aviation analytics firm Cirium released a new analysis showing passenger traffic by global airlines could surpass 2019 levels before the end of the year. In addition, the International Aviation Group (IAG) recently said it expects capacity to reach about 97% of 2019 levels for the whole of 2023.

However, despite the recovery of the aviation industry after the COVID-19 pandemic, many factors are considered to have an impact on IATA’s forecast such as fuel prices, aircraft shortages, and labor shortages which make air tickets more expensive.

According to aviation analytics company Cirium, global airline passenger traffic could surpass 2019 levels before the end of this year.

Previous forecasts have suggested that global airline passenger traffic will not recover until 2024. However, according to the latest analysis by Cirium, traffic is showing a faster-than-expected recovery, with growth in terms of RPK (revenue passenger kilometers). If this momentum continues, it is expected that in October, global airline passenger traffic will return to the pre-pandemic levels despite the Asia-Pacific market and China not keeping up with other countries.

According to Rob Morris, global head of consultancy at Cirium, based on schedules in April, Asia intra-regional, trans-Pacific, Asia-Europe and domestic Indonesia are the markets that record 15% lower traffic compared to the same period 2019. Notably, China was the country to record the lowest international airline capacity, an average decrease of 68% compared to pre-Covid levels because it is slower than others in reopening international flight routes (in January 2023).

Earlier this month, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) said that global airline traffic had recovered by over 88% compared to March 2019, with total domestic passenger traffic returning to near pre-pandemic levels (98.9%).

The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) also forecasts that global air travel demand will fully recover and increase by about 3% compared to 2019 by the end of this year.